I think it matters for residency placement depending on 2 things: what you want to do and where you want to go. If you're coming from the midwest and you want to go to California or Boston for residency, you better be at Michigan, UChicago, WashU, or Northwestern. This is nothing against the other schools in the midwest, but it is a fact that most East Cost and especially California schools are biased towards their own. But if you look at U.Chicago's residency placement, you'll notice that they place a good number into East and West coast schools. If you have your heart set on dermatology at Mass General, you better go to Harvard, otherwise you won't get there. The other reason it matters is for which specialty you want to choose. If you want to do internal med and then sub-specialize into cardiology or nephrology etc, then it doesn't matter where you go. But if you want dermatology, ortho, opthamology, etc, then your research opportunities (which proves your interest and gives you a definite advantage) are much better at "brand name schools." Hope this helps.
